Perhaps there was another motive for your gift. Perhaps this was less about the deficiencies of the East Coast's technology landscape and more about winning the game of "one-upmanship" that wealthy donors and institutions tend to play.

The good people of Dusseldorf, Germany, and specifically the IKB Bank, which specializes in loans to small and medium-size businesses, has kindly endowed Harvard University's engineering school with a gift of $400m. Strangely, though, the Harvard Engineering School was renamed after hedge-fund manager John A. Paulson, not IKB, and thereby hangs a tale.

This case against Tourre is an odd one. Despite the efforts of the SEC to characterize him as another swashbuckling master of the universe, he's really not that kind of figure at all and that personality, reflected in this email, may well surface during the trial.

The prospect of going over the fiscal cliff cast an additional pall on the markets, with many investors "fleeing to safety" until "things settle down." I am unaware of any stock market gurus who predicted all of these events, but what if they had?

The guy had two full-time jobs: running for reelection and running the country. And yet every month he takes about an hour from his schedule to shake hands, chat briefly and take photos with members of the armed forces attached to the White House. Each is allowed one tag-along parent. I won the toss.

As a society, we rarely celebrate simple competence and the ability to deliver. Instead, we demand superstars. This non-stop need to do better and better is what unifies Lehrer with Wall Street miscreants.

Our elections have replaced horse racing as the sport of kings. Only these kings are multi-billionaire, corporate moguls who by the divine right, not of God, but the United States Supreme Court and its Citizens United decision, are now buying politicians like so much pricey horseflesh.

Wall Street "veteran" Leon Cooperman has written an "Open Letter to President Obama" that provides us with a glimpse into the mindset of our 21st century corporate overlords. What's put a bee in Mr. Cooperman's bonnet is the president's "tone" toward billionaires like himself.

There's something inherently wrong with a political economy where those in power sell the people a bag of goods: Tax cuts for the rich and corporations; deregulation; "free trade" bills; wars and excessive military spending; slashing social programs.

The Wall Street elite seems completely befuddled by the Occupy Wall Street movement. The demonstrators are called "unsophisticated," or misguided, or much worse. Here's a short note to the titans of Wall Street to help them understand what's happening.